YM155 inhibits tumor growth and enhances chemosensitivity to cisplatin in osteosarcoma

Chemoresistance is the principal reason for poor survival and disease recurrence in osteosarcoma patients. Survivin, a family member of the inhibitor of apoptosis proteins, plays an important role in inhibition of apoptosis. Survivin is expressed in a vast majority of human cancers, which is often correlated with poor prognosis in a wide variety of cancer patients. Furthermore, survivin expression is often related with chemoresistance in cancer cells, including osteosarcoma (OS). Here, we evaluated the therapeutic potential of YM155, a selective survivin suppressant alone and in combination with cisplatin using human OS models.

U-2 OS, SW1353, MG-63 cells were treated with YM155, and/or cisplatin, and cell viability, apoptosis, survivin protein expression levels were then evaluated. Furthermore, the efficacy of YM155 combined with cisplatin was further examined in established xenograft models.

YM155 was sufficient to induce spontaneous apoptosis of OS cells. Combination with YM155 significantly augmented the cytotoxicity of cisplatin in OS cells. Combination treatment of YM155 and cisplatin showed antiproliferative effects and induced a greater rate of apoptosis than the sum of the single-treatment rates and promoted tumor regression in established OS xenograft models.

Our findings provide evidence that YM155 could act as a survivin inhibitor on OS cells. Chemotherapeutic approaches using YM155 might enhance the benefit of the cisplatin in the treatment of OS cells. YM155 could be further developed as a potential therapeutic agent for the treatment of OS.